Lodhran police on Sunday announced the arrest of the alleged rapist and killer of a six-year-old girl who went missing last week.

The child, a resident of Ward 2 in Dunyapur, went missing from her house on Sunday, Feb 18. Her father Muhammad Jamil informed police that she was missing a day later. The police searched for her in various places but couldn’t find her.

On Friday, Feb 23, residents of a colony near the Wasti Noorpur graveyard saw a body in a pond and called the police. They took the body to the Lodhran District Headquarters Hospital for a post-mortem examination and sent tissue samples to the forensic laboratory for testing.

Police also took a few suspects into custody and gathered the identity cards and cellphone numbers of area residents.

District Police Officer (DPO) Lodhran Ameer Taimour at a press conference today announced the arrest of the alleged perpetrator, DawnNews reported.

The DPO, citing medical reports, confirmed that the victim had been raped before she was killed.

The arrested suspect, the victim's paternal cousin, confessed to the crime, the DPO said, adding that the suspect told police he had killed the victim after raping her and had initially disposed off her body in a ditch before later throwing it into a pond.

Lahore teenager accuses cleric of rape

Johar Town police on Saturday registered a first information report (FIR) against a cleric at a local madressah in Lahore on the complaint of a 16-year-old boy who alleged he was raped by the suspect a year ago.

The complainant said in the FIR that he and a few other boys studying at the seminary had allegedly been abused multiple times by the cleric but had remained quiet out of fear.

He alleged that after he was abused a second time, he informed a madressah administrator of the abuse but the perpetrator managed to hush up the matter.

The complainant said that he had also informed his father, but his father was threatened for bringing it up.

The FIR said one other boy also escaped an attempted rape by the cleric after he raised a hue and cry about the incident.

The complainant added that he had quit the madressah after the incident, and that it had taken a lot of courage on his part to finally report the alleged sexual abuse.

Police said the FIR was registered following an initial investigation after three alleged abuse victims came forward against the same cleric.